I don't know how people hate their parents.

At this exact moment I'm dealing with a complicated and stressful situation about my family. It makes me angry at them and I want to hate them and show my decades worth of frustration but at the same moment I just walked past a framed picture of my mom smiling and sitting on her back porch and in that moment I just think about how sweet she can be and how she won't be around forever.

I love them and I hate them and it's too much.

I know that few people will understand this post because most people have a simplistic view of family dynamics and think every household was as simple as theirs. Mine is not and was not. Honestly writing this paragraph is more of an obligation than an addition to my original point but it must be done.

My point is that for those who have had a different experience than that classic "American dream" style of a home life, I don't understand how they make up their mind that they're angry with their family. I respect their self assuredness. But I have none of it in myself. Because despite having a burning hatred and aching loneliness for the things I've been through, I know that deep down, my parents were just traumatized themselves and they did their best to raise their children. It is me who grew up and decided that it wasn't good enough. I guess I hate myself for that.

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ArkBallet · 36-40, F

You’ve reached the point where you can see your parents both as people who wounded you and as people who were themselves wounded, and that’s not an easy perspective to hold. Individual PEOPLE with full lives - not just Mom or Dad in the narrow roles we knew them as. They had dreams that never worked out, heartbreaks they never recovered from, traumas they didn’t have the tools to process. And honestly, I think seeing them as whole people, not just the roles they played in your pain, is a step toward compassion.

Lara2007 · 18-21, F

I completely understand what you're growing through. my childhood was hell because of my parents, because they actually believed in hell. Their efforts to make my life being all about fearing god and marry at 18 and raise a family while staying at home and going to church, was out of love and fear, not because they wanted to torment me. Nevertheless, to save myself from the life they planned for me, I left home the day I turned 18, after months of planning and arranging things with a few good friends. I left a note explaining, but they don't know where I am and I'm going to keep it that way. In a way I do feel sorry for them and I can't say I hate them, but I've felt so liberated ever since and am actually starting at uni next week.
It's alright to feel the way that you do, that's the first step. No need to hate yourself, because they did hurt you, no matter why, and it was clearly not good enough. It's alright to feel that way.

lilylovesgaming1986 · 36-40, F

At time's u just got to forgive and forget. That is what I did with my dad and we talk on the phone all the time. I seen my mom at my uncle and my grandfather funeral. We really didn't speak at all. But I'm not mad at her at all

NativePortlander1970 ·

@lilylovesgaming1986 I refuse to forgive, all it does is give them justification and a license to repeat what they do and did.

Captainjackass · 31-35, M

It’s easy with a lifetime of abuse. Just found out my old man died yesterday and I don’t feel a thing. He was only biologically my parent and I couldn’t care less about his death.

SinlessOnslaught · M

@Captainjackass How do you know I didn't have the same thing.

croatiangirl22 · 26-30, F

I understand sometimes I feel that way to

LordBarbossa · 36-40, T

Each experience is unique and can't be compared to similar ones.

NativePortlander1970 ·

When a parent was an abuser while growing up, my mother was my main bully when I was a kid, so it's easy to hate a parent.

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